
Re: Easy solution
on Mythbusters they made a balloon out of lead. ok it was ginormously impractical but still...
10515 publicly visible posts • joined 1 May 2015
" by using a nuclear thermal rocket or an electric plasma drive using a nuclear reactor for power."
science fiction has made this kind of assumption for quite some time. chemical rockets just aren't efficient enough to do it.
The nuclear engine (fission) is probably the best bet at this time. You could use liquid water or liquid H2 to 'fuel' it (i.e. the mass that must be accelerated out the back end to provide impulse). Existing designs could be used or at least modified to fit the purpose. It would be restartable in space and efficient.
I would prefer to see a fusion reactor, one that uses the H2 naturally occurring in water for propulsion and electricity. H2 could also be in a separate tank, but I think having a series of water tanks (where you separate out the H2 as needed) would be a kind of insurance against tank leakage or meteor damage. So yeah you bring extra fuel. In any case, a linear fusion reactor doesn't exist. It could exist, but nobody's trying to build one as far as I know. You just need a way of confining the hydrogen such that at least SOME of it fuses and heats the water to super-hot steam. Ideally you would want to accelerate only the fusion products to near light speed, but that makes a poor efficiency rocket. Better to have an ideal fuel mass instead, accelerated to a much lower speed, but maximizing the impulse. So yeah some kind of fuel (like water) would be ideal for that. And maybe SALT water would be even better... suck it up directly from the ocean. Very cheap that way on earth.
you don't need to surround the people-tank with shielding. the vast majority of cosmic radiation (outside of the van allen belts) is coming directly from the sun. so you just need to shield against solar flares and more generally against the solar output. I've heard of a 'safe room' concept for solar flare shielding. That may not even be needed in the region between earth and mars, depending on the nature of the ejected particles.
"The nuclear industry doses are ludicrously low"
Uh, no. The 'low' limits are intended to prevent your life expectancy from being significantly reduced due to a known occupational hazard. It's about safety.
I don't think radiation limits are the problem, here. The problem in the nuclear industry is an UNINFORMED PUBLIC being manipulated by a HANDFUL OF ACTIVISTS, whose agenda may or may not have anything to do with nuclear power in and of itself. THAT is what is so "expensive" about nuclear power.
Take the San Onofre nuclear power plant out in California for an example. After doing a refit on both working reactors [new boilers], that was approved by the various agencies, they discovered a design flaw caused by vibration, causing tube leakage [radioactive primary coolant getting into the steam]. Rather than shut down both plants and do an expensive refit, they wanted to run one at reduced power while fixing the other one, to stay marginally profitable. Regulators (during Obaka administration) said *NO*. So what did they do? They SHUT DOWN BOTH PLANTS and LAID OFF HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE. Now it's just sitting there as a place to store nuclear waste. And ELECTRICITY RATE PAYERS are footing THE BILL!
Looks like the "no nukes" crowd WON on that one. wheee...
It's not the radiation dose limits being too low. It's the POLITICS and the LAWSUITS and the LEGAL OBSTRUCTION by "special interests" who, for whatever is their motivation, don't like nuclear power.
the radiation problem is easier to solve than that.
Keep in mind that your average space ship requires FUEL for deceleration once it arrives. Put the fuel, tanks, engine, etc. between you and Mr. Sun and you get excellent radiation shielding! This assumes that the ship CAN be oriented "this way" for most of the trip.
Additionally you'd probably want some kind of artificial gravity in the people-sphere, so the design would have to accommodate 'all of that' while also keeping a large amount of mass [and hydrogen, for neutron moderation] between you and the sun.
/me would go to Mars as long as it's the "wild west" there, not some politically correct "utopia"
this reminds me of something I learned in biology:
a) all living things eat
b) all living things excrete (even dolphins)
c) all living things make copies of themselves (especially bunnies)
'b' is something that goes with being alive. Yes, we're CRAPPING IN SPACE, too.
What's different about humans: we generally clean up OUR crap, and the crap of OTHER living things...
(none of the OTHER animals are willing to do this, except maybe dung beetles)
having private gitlab servers, ones that do everything either github or gitlab would do, would be a good thing. Not everything belongs "in the cloud".
If GitLab requires that they be licensed for their revenue model, I'm not opposed to that at all. Assuming GitLab uses private repos for their revenue model, they could just add "licensed servers" as part of that, too, along with the usual support (and maybe private offsite mirroring?) that local repo owners are likely to want.
"Yes, women are the overwhelming majority of sexual harassment complainants because of a small but significant minority of men behave like pigs."
And they NEVER lie about it, right?
It seems there's a certain allegation running around Washington D.C. at the moment, where a certain accusing female is being invited to testify under oath, and lots of backpedaling going on.
The truth is, such allegations can be used as a form of leverage [particularly if false], to either get rid of someone you don't like, or to maneuver up the career ladder. These risks are REAL, and I think the truth of the matter is that the ABUSE of such allegations does more disservice to actual VICTIMS than anything else. It motivates people to NOT hire them, because of the expensive risks involved.
There's almost an implied "You don't DARE *FIRE* a woman" policy demanded of you, if you're a male, and in a management position. Fire a woman without miles of documentation to cover your ass, and it's EXPENSIVE lawsuits where settling is the only option. Whereas, to fire a man, all you need is an 'allegation', right?
And when back-stabbing is done by a woman, and you complain about it, or try to correct it, you're "just being mean" "to the girl". It's a hypocrisy held by both men AND women, though I think women managers are less likely to tolerate it (the 'tears of sympathy' shed over stupid things while being caught back-stabbing or undermining others, that is).
How can you run a company in THIS kind of environment? You can't. Therefore, managers may be quietly 'hesitant' to hire women, not because they don't do the job as well, but because they MIGHT SUE YOU INTO BANKRUPTCY! You have to be EXTRA careful. And this "me too" nonsense is JUST FUEL FOR THE FIRE. Were it not the case, I doubt any kind of 'silent discrimination' would be happening. But I bet you'll find it, and it will be VERY hard to prove.
Of course, in cases where the allegations are REAL, let the perpetrator have both barrels. In this day and age, it is no surprise that it makes HEADLINES when it DOES happen. [and that's not very often, now is it?]
by the time 2024 rolls around, there won't be a whole lot of engineers out there that understand vacuum tubes [aka 'valves'] very well, at least not well enough to appreciate the process of trying to rapidly determine matched sets from a pile of contenders. Well, maybe some guitar amp and tube-audio enthusiasts might, but that's about it.
Also have to appreciate the level of hacking done back then, because the war demanded results, NOW, and there was no time to waste.
"a constant target for cyber attacks" - especially if they're using Outlook or a Microsoft server.
Gotta stop letting people preview attachments inline (or worse, CLICKING on them!) and clicking on links in HTML mail. "Must install this application to view content" - "OK".
/me sees a solution involving a clue bat and a cat5 o' nine tails.
"I never really understood wtf .NET was meant to achieve."
Back in history to the 'dot-bomb' era of the early 21st century... around 2002-ish as I recall.
Ballmer announced this ".Net" (aka '.Not') initiative, in which this web server backend would be magically developed, and everybody would use IIS on a Windows server instead of Apache with PHP on Linux, just to get this new wonderful "new, shiny" thing. Hop on the bandwagon, because THEN you'll have:
a) Microsoft 'Passport' - a one-login for the ENTIRE internet! [didn't happen, still not even with Win-10-nic's cloudy login]. In truth Amazon and others refused to pay the 'Microsoft tax' and wouldn't use it. DOA.
b) pre-made back-end services and that new programming lingo, "C#" (aka 'C-pound'). I have yet to see it go above 10% on the TIOBE index. Seriously, it's as bad as NodeJS and people are using NodeJS instead, from what I can tell.
c) and the implied lock-in to MICROSOFT PLATFORMS as "solutions". 'take over the world'.
well, it was probably an improvement over IIS in a lot of ways, except IIS was coded in NATIVE INSTRUCTIONS and didn't require some stupid P-code or interpreter. Later on, that part diminished.
After this, some "dim bulb" at Micro-shaft "decided" that ".Not" should be on DESKTOPS, too. And so it was expanded (read: bloated) to include ALL KINDS of 'GUI things' for C-pound's benefit.
THEN some independent people invented 'mono' and got "the blessings" of Micro-shaft, which culminated into the release of (you guessed it) ".Net Core". All of this over a period of more than 15 years in which as much bloat as you can imagine (and then a whole lot more) was injected into ".Not" until it became the monolithic cluster-pile of FAIL that it is TODAY.
Meanwhle, REAL developers of Windows and cross-platform software are either using C, C++, or Java to do so. C-pound is a *WANNABE* at best. I've seen attempts at writing Mono cross-platform applications in the past. Usually C-pound only gets the least common denominator of support on "anything that isn't Windows running the latest new, shiny version of '.Not'".
And so, I hope, there's more understanding of ".Not" now... and I really would NOT recommend tying YOUR success into one of Micro-shaft's control mechanisms.
only anarchists are against ALL regulations. My point of de-regulation is that if it works WITHOUT new regulations, why add them NOW except for fulfilling some kind of ULTERIOR MOTIVE...
I have as yet to see a compelling argument about what "net neutrailty" is attempting to FIX. Rather, this mis-named concept is ACTUALLY attempting to DESTROY FREEDOM, one step at a time. Froggy in a pot of water on the stove, perhaps? When it hits a certain temperature, it's TOO LATE.
"priority given just because of ISP deals doesn't look fair at all."
SEE? SEE? SEE? It _IS_ about "envy" of "they get that and I do not" (even though they paid for it).
So why don't YOU make a deal yourself? Oh you don't have the money? Well I guess there's an actual BENEFIT to working hard and doing the right things so that you can AFFORD better!
And that's been my point all along. "net neutrality" (which is nothing about 'neutrality' but about "equalizing outcomes") is about, well, EQUALIZING OUTCOMES and _PREVENTING_ one party [whether individual or corporation] from BUYING BETTER SERVICE LEVEL, because it's - *ahem* - **NOT** **FAIR** [waaaah, waaaah, I'm a snowflake, waaaah waaaah].
OK that last part was uncalled for but I did it anyway, because it was *FUNNY*.
icon, because, facepalm
"Life _is_ pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something." - Dread Pirate Roberts, 'Princess Bride'
"I prefer a wild west internet to a potemkin village internet."
then you should study what 'Net Neutrality' is REALLY about, because 'potemkin village' is what you'd actually GET.
'Wild west' is the internet WITHOUT 'net neutrality' [which again, has NOTHING to do with protecting freedom nor free speech, it's about keeping everyone 'the same' when it comes to service level, *AND* setting the precedent of CONTROLLING INTERNET CONTENT - that last part SHOULD frighten you, yes].
Think about it: What was the internet like BEFORE Obaka's FCC decided to REGULATE it? And is it STILL that now, with Trump DE-regulating it back to what it was? What makes you *FEEL* [not think, obviously] that this will create "a potemkin village" ? It's "wild west" now, and will remain so, as long as it's kept DE-regulated!!!
Yes. the potemkin village deception is FROM THE LEFT. Liberty = 'wild west' = de-regulation, not MORE regulation. See?
the U.S. Constitution is clear when it comes to interstate commerce. Long ago the decision was made that communications networks are (by definition) a form of 'interstate commerce', beginning with telegraph and telephone services. Even 'last mile' is under FCC jurisdiction, and this is where Cali-fornicate-you law would be superseded by Federal law. That's generally how it's done.
Besides, "net neutrality" is such a MISNOMER anyway, it doesn't describe what 'they' are really trying to do with it. The single biggest thing seems to be prioritization of some packets over others, particularly when it's paid prioritization. The end result is that everyone ends up having the same mediocre level of service, despite what you can afford to get. And so the "everyone is just another brick in the wall" militant-gummint-control-freak-socialist-types, who *FEEL* that *NOBODY* should *EVER* be able to "get something better for more money", want to PUNISH achievers by essentially DENYING them "the better level of service" that THEY can afford!
That's all it is. ENVY, and 'equalizing outcomes' on the backs of the achievers... with the notable exception, of course, of EXEMPTING those who MAKE the laws and their crony friends and contributors, because *THEY* will *ALWAYS* have *THEIRS* through special favors and exceptions, whereas 'the rest of us' must LIVE with that crap. It's _ALWAYS_ "the masses" aka "just another brick in the wall" minions, regular folk, who will pay for it somehow.
well, couple that with *NO* 'Management Engine' [or its equivalent] and I'll be wanting one for my desktop.
It'll need to run FreeBSD though... maybe I'd have to wait longer for that one
(nobody said - IS IT infected with a 'management engine' like Intel and AMD? Or were the designers security conscious enough to AVOID that trap?)
I happen to _LIKE_ OSS, thanks. It's the driver model on FreeBSD. Not sure why Linux didn't just adopt it, too. Ah, well...
As for running things on WSL, maybe there should be a LSW or BSDSW i.e. something Microsoft writes and supports such that Windows software can run with Linux or *BSD as the OS. I'd even PAY MONEY for it.
And yes, this means a PROPER GUI that layers itself onto X11 and does _NOT_ require Wayland!
"I actively don't want my personal electronics to connect to my work network"
assuming it's non-trivial to have 2 network configs, yeah (or to shut off the stupid MDM crap when you're using it outside of the office, or with a non-company login).
Very often a corporation will have a 'guest' network that anybody can use, the kind of thing you'd offer up for a visiting exec or a potential client. I would suggest leaving that as an unmanaged network outside of the normal company firewall, with minimal filtering on it [just enough to prevent obvious abuse] and also DISABLING uPNP on it.
then you don't need MDM stuff just to access company web-mail etc. via https using the 'guest' network. But yeah maybe some idiot upper manager bought some overpriced pile of software that included MDM for every kind of phone invented, and he needs to justify his purchase...
"At least 20% of any Bash script seems to be spent parsing out the results of other commands using a witches' brew of sed, awk and grep"
If the entire script were "that" and it worked reliably, I'd give the author a beer. AND, maybe a promotion.
The alternative is to write a C language utility that does some of the more complex stuff. Usually a 1-pager that does stdin/stdout with printf and scanf etc.. Not too hard even for a junior coder right out of "pre-school" (aka CS major that just graduated from college - the REAL schooling starts with your first paid programming assignment!).
You may be confusing bash with Perl in this regard. Perl is often filled with regex stuff. It also has objects if you like those. The fact is you don't have to do it "that way" (with the "witch's brew"). But often, it's faster to write if you DO do it "that way". In fact I kinda like the "witch's brew" analogy. I think I'll start using it.
/me likes to encapsulate the "witch's brew" as functions. that way, the real code is readable and maintainable, and you can debug the "witch's brew" separately, with test data, before putting it into production. Been there, done that, should've written the book. I also use comments so others can maintain it.
added note: pre-emptively I'm going to mention using "the more secure versions" of printf/scanf when unknown input sources are involved. Someone will criticize me and narrowly focus on one tiny nitty detail like that. this is to pre-empt it. Yes, captain obvious, you DO want to keep security in mind.
"see all the bash scripts which break if a path contains a space."
spaces in file names are *EVIL*. don't allow them on your network. and you can backslash the spaces in case you absolutely MUST allow them, like this.
/the_share/Some\ Idiot\ Put\ Spaces\ In\ The\ Name.whatever
you can make that happen with this:
sed 's/ /\\ /g'
you're welcome.
EXISTING tools. they exist. and they still do the job, very very well. Best to learn how to use what's there and not inject some Micro-shaft NIH-agenda bloatware onto a perfectly good Linux or BSD system...
Also keep in mind - Embrace Extend Extinguish.
"BASH doesn't support consuming .net libraries directly like PowerShell does"
you say that as if it were a BAD thing... I think the 'lack of .Not support' is a GOOD thing. It means it's not internally polluted with "that architecture" in mind.
"PowerShell has some very powerful processing features built in that BASH is utterly missing"
And it's missing in Perl as well? How about (instead) writing a quicky piping filter in C, in accordance with the 'UNIX principle' of "do one thing, well". Yeah, 'too hard' for Windows admins. I believe they don't have that much of an intelligence vacuum, to be honest. But I suppose I _could_ be wrong about THAT detail...
As for Python, it's too bass-ackwards for efficient coding (much like '.Not' and C-pound). I find Python to be extremely useful for quicky things but a poor choice for anything above prototype level.
if the only thing keeping you away from bash and perl is the alleged 'arcane syntax' I prefer 'arcane' over 'bloatware inefficient' (aka ANYTHING using '.Not' in ANY fashion) **ANY** day.
How come they can't just learn bash, perl? Why must we inject Microsoft's insane model (read: power-hell and '.Not') and way of doing things into the world of POSIX shells and scripting lingos?
This is like building your house out of glass because you like windows. Yeah bad 'pun'ishment there. Careful not to play ball games in the yard [or throw stones].
"A refusal to change with the times"
I am _OFFENDED_ that you *FEEL* I'm REFUSING to CHANGE "with the times".
Except, of course, I _AM_. Refusing to behave like AN IDIOT is a good thing.
see what happens when the OTHER side is "offended"? I bet you don't give a crap! And neither do I, about people being "offended" about the terms master / slave in a technical context.
Let's all STOP GIVING A CRAP. Then we'll get along.
It's a form of passive-aggressive behavior, to pretend it's "others" then "bring it to your attention" like that...
'Passive-aggressive' is considered (by some at least) to be a psychological DISORDER. For most of us, it's just A PAIN IN THE ASS.
Ever had to work with a passive-aggressive who targets you? I have. Several times. No thanks. And getting them punished for it: impossible. All you can do is *QUIT* and say why on the way out the door...
"male dominance over a female partner!!"
yeah and with all of the BDSM references for master/slave LAST time around...
I still think Tori and Uke would get past the radar. They're Judo terms. Judo. 'Tori' literally means 'bird' and is the person doing the throw (also according to the web page from the verb 'toru' which has a meaning of take or pick up or choose - but if you've ever had a bird steal your food, it makes sense). 'Uke' means 'receiver' more or less and is the person being thrown.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tori_(martial_arts)
any OTHER connotation, political or sexual, was (*cough*) accidental.
/me thinks "at least I didn't say 'tops' and 'bottoms' - no, wait..."
"start using the 'n' word more. It just means black person."
Uh, no. Direct racial epithets aren't the same thing as the use of the term 'master' and/or 'slave' with respect to one another in a technical context.
[but maybe you made a good point anyway, in a backwards kind of way - 'master' and 'slave' aren't racial epithets unless you WANT them to be, so that you can control other people's speech or something]
Oh, come on now... at least point out something we can snark at, not just make fun of their name and use profanity.
Like maybe that they treat end-users like Minions instead of Customers, by FORCING us into 2D Flatso, spyware, adware, forced updates, strong-armed 'Cloudy Login', 'the Store', yotta yotta. And being their QA department.
"The next time these chuckleheads boast about their quarterly profits, remember part of that largess comes at the expense of having anything resembling a responsible QA process."
cannot be emphasized enough
(insiders and end users - those are the new 'QA department', with forced updates to perpetuate it)
Microsoft does not do "testing" any more. It's why they have minions insiders.
And they probably don't have a sense of humor, either.
Hey Micro-shaft: it's ready AIM fire, not ready FIRE aim. Or, in your case, patch, TEST, upload to servers, not what YOU did: patch, upload to servers, test.
Well, that's right - you don't do "test" any more! So you REALLY did patch, upload [no test].
icon, because, facepalm for the OBVIOUS 'lameness' of this moment
this problem was solved in the 1960's during the Gemini program. They also had a drill-operated wrench, if I remember correctly. the back story, as I recall, was that they put a test rig filled with typical operations like turning wrenches and screwdrivers and using a drill into the back end of a gemini capsule where it had an equipment space set up for this kind of thing. An astronaut went outside in a suit and tried to do all that, but failed miserably. Then NASA came up with a brilliant plan of using a swimming pool to simulate zero gravity [which they've been doing ever since]. They rehearsed the mission, and tried it again, this time successful.
Anyway, a bit of NASA history from the dark spider-webbed recesses of my mind.
also mentioned (sort of) here
The swimming pool helped them 'get it right' with Gemini XII
who was trying to plug a leak by drilling down to where the leak was so he could put some kind of leak-stopping material in there. the hole would've been considered 'benign' and apparently it was covered up so it couldn't easily be seen.
Then, the patch that was made on Earth failed, causing the recent leakage. Their fix was kinda like what I propose the original fix was - inject something into the hole to stop the leak, and cover it up.
Occam's razor in this case.
(not nearly as interesting as snarking all over it and pointing fingers and conspiracy theories)
"Washington Post claims president Trump is a sorcerer creating storms."
you know, that's worth a pause for thought, at least...
when you take *THIS* kind of lunacy into consideration, and apparently from all angles [except Fox and a handful of others], is it any wonder Trump is 'a little unhappy' with 'the media' ? They've been filtering out all of the good things he's done (economy, trade, N. Korea, etc.) and only reporting what they perceive to be the bad, mixed with obviously biased opinions, continuously, for the last 2+ years, worse than they ever did to Nixon as far as I remember - admittedly being a snark-meister is more fun, but they are being at least a *little* irresponsible, ya know?
Oh, and the new Amazon location is possibly the one here in the San Diego area. They're apparently looking to hire 'DevOps' people. One of the ads I saw practically begged people to come work for a 'socially conscious' company or something like that. I think I'd rather sleep at night, thanks (and keep my stomach contents on the inside where they belong). If the benefit for working at Amazon is working for a 'socially conscious' company, I have to consider some of the recent news about Google where they (*LITERALLY*) did a big 'group hug' in response to Trump being elected, and someone recently leaked the video to Breitbart.
In the past, certain 'Silly Valley' companies have been reported to have colluded together to drive down wages with secret 'do not recruit' pacts, and to use H1-B visas to hire foreign workers and kinda 'trap them here' so they can pay them less and drive the wage scale down. Trump's approach to immigration threatens this kind of thing [which is good, because nobody outside of 'them' likes wage manipulation].
Couple that with some of the 'big tech' company policies with countries like China (Google helping the 'great firewall' to block content, for example, something called 'Dragonfly') ya think maybe *THAT* kind of thing is ultimately why a lot of these very wealthy "tech" CEOs don't like Trump??? Trump is in their way for driving down wages and controlling the flow of information and goods here in the U.S. (and of course 'the world'). And apparently they're 'globalists' and Trump is 'America First'. It's an obvious divide in politics that can't be crossed.
So yeah, maybe Amazon's CEO should review his own company policies, and remove the obvious blinding 'log' from his own eye, before trying to remove the spec of sawdust from Trump's eye. Yeah, that was in the bible someplace, an illustration about hypocrisy.
I 'outgrew' '.Not' back in the early noughties, when they thought it up.
I just do a native compile. Seems to go blisteringly fast, too. It's WAY better than some p-code wannabe that's part of ".Not". Bleah. Throw it away along with 'garbage collection' and the bass-ackwards pseudo-object-oriented way of doing things that's so "core" to ".Not".
I mean, do you REALLY need "Universe.Galaxy.system.planet.continent.country.province" <line break> ".county.city.district.street.house.pet.flea" just to get to "flea"? beginning by enumerating the 'universe' collection? And getting EVERY! STINKING! DETAIL! about EVERY! OTHER! FLEA! during the enumeration to find the matching flea? Seriously?
OK maybe not THAT bad, but it was an illustration of the bass-ackwards thinking behind ".Not"s very design. Thanks, I'll use API functions instead, and write efficient C/C++ code that compiles to a NATIVE BINARY and doesn't need a MONOLITHIC TOP-HEAVY SHARED LIB [that gets updated _ALL_ of the time because it's so flawed] just to LOAD [let alone RUN].
[and - dirty little secret - if I design my C++ code properly, I can compile it for MFC _or_ wxWidgets with the SAME! CODE! BASE! Imagine that!]
"Windows 10 is worse than shite. It's broken to the point of being utterly useless."
well, I couldn't go THAT far and remain accurate. It's not 'utterly useless'. IRRITATING for sure. But, unfortunately, people really ARE able to use it to get things done. Except during certain phases of the mandatory updates. [and I don't want to schedule my life around Micro-shaft's convenience, thank you]
I still despise Win-10-nic and the horrible attitudes of those who continue to try to force-market and strong-arm us into it.
there are a handful of people, admittedly, who actually _LIKE_ windows 10. What *REALLY* *PISSES* *ME* *OFF* is how *THAT* is used to *JUSTIFY* *CRAMMING* *IT* *INTO* *THE* *REST* *OF* *OUR* *RECTUMS* because Micro-shaft and a small percentage of windows users *FEEL* it is better, and so the *REST* of us *MUST* *USE* *IT* *TOO*.
taking away choice is BAD customer relations. It's more like... *A* *MONOPOLY* !!!
"running software that only runs on Windows"
In many cases, this is easily rectified. In a few cases, sadly, it is not. However, alternatives most likely exist. I think it was said best when Ernie Ball got one of those "predatory audits" back in the _very_ early noughties, and has been "Rockin' on without Microsoft" ever since.
link: "https://www.cnet.com/news/rockin-on-without-microsoft/" (I hate captcha, using 'a' tags forced it to happen, go fig, I'm not a bot, and 'noscript' breaks captcha anyway)
According to the article, Ernie Ball (the company) saved about $80k 'right away', nearly paying the $100k fine+costs. No doubt he's got 'a fleet' of computers, people who need to be trained to use them, etc..
Yeah, "not that hard". No thanks for the FUD. here's a nice example of why Linux is a viable (and in this case, WAY less expensive) solution. Worth pointing out they use a commercial Linux (RH). Imagine what kind of money (and maybe even time!) you might save by using CentOS or a Debian derivative [including Devuan] and just having Linux-savvy IT on the premises.
"SatNad and his crew in Redmond get more like [Big Brother] each and every day"
Like that graphic with Bill G. as Locutus of Borg. It's been happening for a while. SatNad is just the latest. I would say 'Borg Queen' but that has so many alternate implications I figured I'd leave that one alone... oops, too late.
When i went to check on a security vulnerability yesterday, I had to load the MS link for the CVE in a separate security context and process incarnation of firefox that allows script AND cookies [and then dumps it all when I close it - ha ha]. Upon loading the MS link for the CVE report, which basically didn't tell me anything useful, I had to AGREE to their TOU for some @#$% reason...
just how far are they gonna TAKE that #&%$ anyway?